Weather has forced us to remain in Port Taranaki for another 3 days as we missed our weather window yesterday to head to Tasman. The main reason was due to an engine fault which necessitated the fitting of a new Lift pump to our stbd engine (even though it is barely run in)! We sorted this problem this morning after ferrying the diesel technician to the boat at 7:15am today. Tom was a huge Taranaki boy and we joked about how we would be able to fit him along side our engine as it was very close to our Generator. Between us, we managed to get the job done and everything tested fine after clearing the fault codes. I wondered about the merit in technical engine management systems that invariably mean that any issues are BIG issues.
We will take advantage of the extended time here by climbing Paratutu Rock and visiting the Len Lye Art Centre in New Plymouth. Yesterday was interesting, at 8:30am a huge number of local farmers turned up at the ramp with their boats to go hunting for Marlin. How did we know they were farmers? Well many were still wearing their gum boots and those that weren’t had the sun tan tide-mark on their legs where the top of the gum boots would have been!